The present invention relates to baseball bats. More particularly, the present invention relates to practice baseball bats for teaching baseball players proper stance and swing mechanics with visual feedback for developing proper hitting skills.
Baseball and softball are team participation sports enjoyed by many individuals with wide variations in skills. Organized baseball leagues are provided for children as well as adults. These leagues include amateur play as well as professional. The amateur leagues are primarily directed to children""s participatory leagues, but it also includes high school, college, and post-graduate amateur leagues for participants unable to compete in the professional leagues.
Baseball is a game of developed skills involving the throwing of a baseball, catching the baseball, and hitting the baseball with a baseball bat. Baseball games are competitive events between two teams. Prior to games, however, skills are developed through coaching and training in practice sessions. Coaches who typically are experienced players, teach other players how to develop the skills required for the game. While each of the positions on the team have differing skill requirements, each member of the team becomes involved in the hitting aspect of the game (except generally for pitchers in the professional American League).
The ability to hit a baseball with a bat involves the batter taking a standing position at the plate with the bat held in a rearward cocked position. The batter must swing the bat from the laterally rearward cocked position, through a frontal hitting position, and to a follow-through laterally forward position. The bat is swung at an appropriate time after the pitcher facing the batter has thrown the ball towards the plate where the batter is standing. At the appropriate time, the batter commences the swing. The swing is based on the batter making the necessary eye and arm coordination for swinging the bat at the appropriate time in view of the perceived travel of the baseball towards the plate. The batter must take into account the speed of the ball, the type of pitch and the expected flight path to the plate. Ideally, the bat impacts the baseball and causes the ball to travel outwardly from the plate into the baseball field, or preferably beyond.
Hitting a baseball with a baseball bat is a developed skill. Batters are considered successful when they have a hitting percentage of between about 0.250 and 0.333 or more. In other words, a batter is considered successful if a hit is obtained between one-fourth and one-third of the number of times the batter is at bat. In addition to batting average, some batters become skillful at hitting grounders which are balls that are hit downwardly to bounce on the ground and through the infield. Other batters become adept at hitting long flies to the outfield. Further, batters may develop skills for hitting the ball in particular pitches to selected parts of the ballfield, in order to advance base runners.
Because hitting is a developed skill, batting practice typically involves the batter standing at the batters box and swinging at a number of pitches. Pitching machines have been developed to throw baseballs towards the plate in order to give the batter repetitive opportunities to swing a baseball bat at a significant number of balls thrown over a period of time. Coaches observe the batter""s stance, swing, and follow-through mechanics, and provide guidance as to changes the batter may make in order to be more successful at hitting.
In addition to using conventional baseball bats for practice, others have provided special practice baseball bats. One such bat includes an elongated opening that starts approximately two-thirds the length of the bat from the handle. The opening is dimensioned to give clearance to a standard baseball along an imaginary line through the center of the bat. This center portion is typically referred to as the sweet spot, in that baseballs hit at the center location are best driven by the batter into the playing field. Balls hit on an upper portion of the bat tend to pop-up, while balls hit on a lower portion of the bat tend to be driven into the ground as grounders for fielding by an infielder. In this practice bat, a net is provided outwardly of the backside of the bat. The bat catches the ball within the opening and the ball passes through the bat into the net. The bottom of the net is open allowing for the ball to drop to the ground. Another practice bat provides a hollow end for receiving baseballs with an opening for ejecting a ball. The ball is ejected by flipping the bat upwardly to toss a ball through the opening into the air. The batter then swings the bat in order to hit the ball into the playing field.
While these practice bats provide practice in hitting, there are drawbacks to their use. The bat with the net does not provide a true indication as to the performance of the batter when he has successfully swung the bat in that the ball is caught by the net backwardly of the bat rather than being directed into the playing field. The magazine-style practice bat requires frequent reloading. The balance, weight, and performance of this bat is not as a conventional baseball bat, so this practice bat does not provide a true representation of the swinging mechanics for a baseball bat.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an improved practice bat for learning swing mechanics for hitting thrown baseballs. It is to such that the present invention is directed.
The present invention meets the need in the art by providing an improved practice baseball bat for assisting batters to learn proper swing mechanics for hitting thrown baseballs. The practice baseball bat for assisting batters comprises an elongate member having a handle end that tapers into a barrel portion and terminates in an opposing distal end. The handle end and a substantial portion of the barrel are circular in cross-sections. An impact portion of the barrel defines a notch having a planar hitting surface recessed from an exterior surface of the barrel. The hitting surface provides a preferred portion for impacting a thrown baseball with the success of hitting being observable by the carry flight of the baseball into the playing field.
Objects, advantages and features of the present invention will become apparent from a reading of the following detailed description of the invention and claims in view of the appended drawings.